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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27574529">Love conquers a small range of things</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cuits/pseuds/Cuits'>Cuits</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fleabag (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Post-Canon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 21:09:58</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,853</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27574529</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cuits/pseuds/Cuits</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s been three months since she last saw the priest and she feels the pain less acute now, but the loss of him in her life is like a ghost limb: ever-present and life-defining.</p><p>She feels his absence like she feels her mother’s absence. Like she feels Boo’s absence. He took a part of her with him, they all did, and she fears that if she lets herself love any more people she will end up with a hole filled with emptiness where the person she was used to be.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Fleabag/Priest (Fleabag)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>116</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Yuletide 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Love conquers a small range of things</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/PaleBlueEis/gifts">PaleBlueEis</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>She doesn’t go back to Sunday mass, (or any day mass for that matter). She would like to say that it is because she is a good person and she respects his wishes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It is not.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It is because it is too fucking painful, okay? She is almost thirty-four and her heart has been broken a million times already, and the sum of it hurts like fuck, the sum of it all hurts almost as much as seeing him choosing an almost-certainly-inexistent, almighty being over her. Every. Fucking. Sunday.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So she doesn’t go to mass but if she sometimes walks in front of his church, well, that is just something that happens.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is just a little bit into masochism anyway. More than a little bit when done properly but that is neither here nor there. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>This time, when the world comes crashing down on her, she doesn’t drink herself into oblivion or smoke her weight in fancy menthol cigarettes. She chooses not to </span>
  <em>
    <span>date</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Doesn’t even call Misogynistic Sex God again, which is how she knows she is really fucked up this time; somehow the prospect of nine orgasms in one night isn’t as appealing as wallowing in memories of her own fingers caressing the beautiful, beautiful neck of her priest while she cries in an empty bathtub.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So yeah. Really, really, fucked up.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She stuffs herself with pesto pasta and chocolate chip ice-cream, which she knows is disgusting, and doesn’t even flinch when half her food and a significant amount of beer end up on her ugly yoga pants and her largest cotton t-shirt.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How are you?” her sister asks her in that tone of voice that is 80% business, 10% concern and 10% disinterest in the answer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Like I lost a fight with God.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, you have a knack for fucked up situations.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fuck you, Claire.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is getting tired of being blamed for everything, even when, you know, she is the one to blame, mainly. But still. Fuck Claire. Fuck Everybody.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Claire sighs, tired and maybe a little understanding. Finland is making her softer around the edges although she won’t tell her that, it will upset the both of them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It will pass.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So I’ve been told.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is happy for her sister and her fucking rewarding, homonymous relationship. She also hates her a little bit for it, not in a weird way. In the sisterly kind of way.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is caught up in her own misery enough not to think when her doorbell rings way past ten pm. She doesn’t even care to look at the peephole before opening the door with the hand that is not holding the gigantic bag of chips already half empty.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hi,” he says. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He is wearing his priest clothes, the black trousers and black shirt with the thingy at the neck, not the bright coloured robe, which makes her suddenly aware of her ugly, stained pants and her oversized t-shirt covered in chip crumbs.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ahmm.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I can’t sleep!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yeah, well, he looks fresh and crisp nevertheless and she is not sure she has even showered today, maybe not even yesterday. The day before that?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you want to… come in?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No!” He is all bottled up energy poorly kept inside, clasping and unclasping his hands as he walks the width of her doorstep and then turns to walk it again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She looks away, to the void where her imaginary confessor lies and mentally makes a face.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He stops to look too. “Don’t do that now!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay!” This whole conversation is already exhausting and she has run out of ice-cream </span>
  <span>upon to</span>
  <span> which ugly cry later. “Jesus.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He stares at her. Really stares at her from head to toe and back again and she feels self-conscious enough to try to get rid of her messed up makeup with her hands, run her fingers through her hair and cross her arms over her chest. The bag of chips dangling awkwardly from her side.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You look terrible,” he says with his mouth half open and his look kind of strained, who knows if in fucking surprise or something else.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fuck you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fuck </span>
  <em>
    <span>you</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His hands are on his hips as he looks at the space on the floor between them. “You have kind of ruined church for me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You have kind of ruined necks for me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He looks up. “What?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What?” she deflects.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shit. I might have to change parish because every time I approach that fucking confessional I get a hard-on.” He sighs. His eyes are bright, his breathing a little erratic and she just wants to cry senselessly and bang him on the street against her front door. “You truly look terrible.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then he steps in and kisses her, sweet and almost chastely for about ten seconds before he grabs her by her nape and deepens the kiss, open-mouthed and slow, and </span>
  <em>
    <span>filthy</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The bag of chips falls to the floor as she fills her hands with him, his hair and his back, and </span>
  <em>
    <span>God</span>
  </em>
  <span>, has he been working out? There is a hole, opening in her stomach that is going to consume her whole but she can’t find the energy to care.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then there is a rattling noise coming from the bushes. They both jump back startled, and when they look in the general direction of the source of the sound, a pair of bright eyes look straight back at them, at him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Are you shitting me?!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He runs, terrified down the street as the fox calmly follows him.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>She starts to shower again every day and wear reasonably clean clothes even at home, not because she is waiting for him to visit her again but because, well, hygiene.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She meets with Belinda, for drinks, for coffee, for more drinks. There is something soothing about Belinda that she could easily cling to and get obsessed about.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"It will not pass," the older woman says to her while holding a complicated cocktail in her hand. "It will dim, it will become another scar but it will not pass. It rarely does."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It is a strange release hearing her words, a vindication of her pain, the knowledge that there are others like her and she is not so completely alone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I don't know if I can keep doing this." She doesn't specify what "this" encompasses because she doesn't really know.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"You can. It will get better, at some point. And then bad again, and good again." Belinda empties what remains of her drink in a single, impressive gulp and puts her hands on her cheeks. "And you will wake up one day, battered and full of scars, completely exhausted by fucking everything, but you will see the beauty of it instead of its ugliness, and you will start to let go of some of the pain and the dead weight on your shoulders."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Do you promise?" She feels sad but a little hopeful.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Yes. I also promise that dead weight will fall off your shoulder and directly into your ass and thighs," she says, grabbing one of her own thighs as if evidencing the fact and grimacing at it. “Look at my thigh, it is full of past mistakes.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I like your thighs.” It is more an unfiltered comment with just a pinch of longing than an intended compliment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You are a sweetheart for meaning that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Belinda lets her head tilt to the left as if contemplating her for a minute and she feels self-conscious. She is better than these past weeks but she still can feel the bags under her eyes from little sleep and a lot of crying, and the paleness of her skin is like a physiological sensation. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She looks down to the floor but Belinda brings her gaze up to her by guiding her chin with a soft hand, she leans on and kisses her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s a soft kiss, chaste. It is meant as a comfort rather than as any kind of tease but she feels it deep in her bones. Belinda pulls back a little, still close enough to feel her breath on her wet lips, and looks at her in a way that is resilient and full of understanding and she feels a little less alone in the world. She feels a little like when Boo looked up at her with a smile and took her hand.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She inhales and she can swear her lungs expand and fill in with more air than before. When she lets the air out of her body, tears start rolling down her face without her explicit consent. The fuckers.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Belinda catches one or two with her hand and that is okay too.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>She invests in therapy, and she uses the term “therapy” in a way that covers almost her every whim. True, she goes to the actual therapist, but that isn’t cheap and so instead of going every week she goes just once a month, and the rest of the time she relies on old-fashioned retail therapy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She buys a couple of gowns that she is never going to be able to wear anywhere, unless she manages to pick up Chris Evans and then she would wear them to the red carpet of some inspirational indie movie or next shitty blockbuster. She also buys coordinated expensive make-up but no shoes, because let’s be real, she is not going to wear either of these gowns anywhere.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wears the dresses though, at home, while she eats frozen yoghurt and watches Notting Hill for the umpteenth time.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The fact that she settles for frozen yoghurt instead of ice-creams clearly means that she is doing better, coping better. The fact that she has found some residual trace of sex-appeal in Hugh Grant must mean she is about to lose what’s left of her troubled mind.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s been three months since she last saw the priest and she feels the pain less acute now, but the loss of him in her life is like a ghost limb: ever-present and life-defining.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She feels his absence like she feels her mother’s absence. Like she feels Boo’s absence. He took a part of her with him, they all did, and she fears that if she lets herself love any more people she will end up with a hole filled with emptiness where the person she was used to be.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is also terrified of a loveless life, of not ever being loved like she has loved.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Of Hugh Grant becoming her new (old?) crush.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is nibbling on an empty spoon and Julia Roberts pleads her case to the unobtrusive, British, book-shop owner when she hears a soft knock on her front door. Summer is approaching again and the days are warmer and longer so she has every blind down. When she opens the door she has somehow managed to forget that there is still sunlight outside her living room and that she is currently wearing a shiny, slimmer gown with a cleavage so low that it threatens to expose her belly button.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What the fuck!!!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That is what she hears while her eyes slowly get used to the sudden light. When they do, the shape and features of her priest present themselves in front of her slowly, as if he was emanating from a divine splash of light or some shit.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What time is it?” she asks, still blinking and using the back of her hand to throw some shade over her eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why? Are you late for the fucking Baftas?!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He is wearing street clothes and a bewildered look on his face. Faded jeans and a polo shirt that makes wonders for his neck. She imagines herself looking at an inexistent camera, like in The Office, to very eloquently say “</span>
  <em>
    <span>fuck</span>
  </em>
  <span>”.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is how I dress now. I’m literally waiting for an actual prince with a real white horse to sweep me off my feet.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is hard.” He doesn’t take another step but instead his hands land on either side of the doorframe and leans on a little, letting his head drop. “I’m sorry I shouldn't have come to your house unannounced. Last time or you know, now.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay,” she says in disbelief because come, the fuck, on.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re barefoot.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wiggles her toes with a chuckle and he looks up back at her face, takes a step and practically annihilates any distance that existed among them. Their heights are so similar now that he has shoes on and she doesn’t, that it would take the minimum amount of movement for them to kiss.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This doesn’t feel like you are that sorry,” she mocks. The enunciation of each syllabus almost making her lips grace his.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I am. God, I am.” He inhales deeply and soundly and takes a step to the side so they are both technically inside her house even though she keeps the door open. “Fuck. You look good.” He shakes his head, closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose. “I </span>
  <em>
    <span>am</span>
  </em>
  <span> sorry.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She stands her ground, lifts her chin as proudly as she can manage while grabbing the handle of the door for dear life.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And yet here you are yet again.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wants him to go away as much as she wants him to stay forever. And sex. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>No, scratch that, she wants sex with him more.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know, I know. It’s just that I used to hear God’s voice so clearly in my head before I knew you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Like a psychotic break?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No! Not like a psychotic break!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He huffs and puffs, rocks back on his feet.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“My life was a mess, you know? Before. Truly, completely fucked up. It’s not that I didn’t care, it was more like I couldn’t cope with so much… crap. And I hurt people. My decisions, they hurt a lot of people I care about. Then I found this God, or God found me, whatever. This pure feeling inside of me, this, this calling and this life, made me a better person. It made me someone that didn’t burn and shit on everything around him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Nice mental image."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Shut up." He looks at her pleadingly. "The problem is that I can’t find that calming, pure feeling inside me anymore because instead, I get the smell of your skin and the way I felt when I was inside of you."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her eyes start to well and she blinks furiously to avoid crying. It sounds like he is asking for some kind of absolution from her, and she is not sure she can give it to him. She can barely keep on breathing normally as her stomach ties itself into a knot, as if he were going to leave her all over again. He is going to break her in a million fucking pieces all over again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t make you choose.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know, I know.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And I don’t want to burn and shit on your business.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nice mental image.” He smiles but his eyes are full of resigned sadness. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He takes a step forward and his presence is suddenly too much, like she has just realized that he is real and within touching distance. She leans on, she doesn’t want to, but she leans on and soon enough he is leaning on too, and grabbing her waist, and kissing her. His fingers dig in and he pulls her toward him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She thought it had passed, this fundamental pull she feels when he is near her, but no, it hasn’t. This clear, calm sensation that he described when he talked about his calling, this is a little of what she feels when she is with him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There is a peace within herself, numbness of the voices that usually shout at her making her anxious and guilty.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then she remembers, and all of that comes rushing back to her</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No,” she says as she pulls back a little. It takes an herculean effort to do so.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t—”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shut up. My life was a royal fucking mess, ok? But it got better and then I met you, but now, now it hurts so fucking much that I feel like I can barely breathe sometimes. I can’t let you break my heart again because I might not survive it this time.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It is a little over-dramatic and also it is not.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sorry.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He looks like he is truly sorry, like he might start to cry at any moment now and it appeases the vengeful bitch inside her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Me too.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He walks down the steps that lead to her door but turns back one last time before walking down the street.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fuck. You really, really look good.”</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>She starts to think that her therapist is completely full of shit, but it makes everybody around her react more positively to her. Like she is less of a mess if someone listens to her crap for an hour a month, or like it is forgivable, at least.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you think your father considered you unforgivable?” the therapist asks with that detached interest that makes her tired of explaining herself until it all feels and sounds ridiculous.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not unforgivable,” she considers. To be true, it doesn’t feel like her father cares enough about either of her daughters to warrant such a strong reaction. “More like bothersome. I annoy him.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The therapist makes a noncommittal sound and she rolls her eyes so hard she is momentaneously afraid she might have sprained something.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So, you think you annoy your father.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, not only my father. I am an overachiever in disguise.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you always deflect with sarcasm?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, I also deflect with sex. Sometimes with alcohol. On some really shitty, memorable nights, I’ve deflected with all three at once.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The therapist looks at her deadpan for various interminable seconds. She is sure she has managed to annoy her therapist too, but fuck her, she pays her for an hour almost as much as she earns in a whole day.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How do you feel about starting dating again?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I am not sure I ever dated before.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>For once she is not trying to be a smartass. When she looks back, she can’t really remember going out with the same person twice to the cinema or the theater or even dinner. It all has been excuses to apply a minimum filter before going to bed with them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Is that considered dating nowadays? Is flirting in church? She really wants to know but she doesn’t want to ask and feel judged because of her ignorance on top of everything else.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Maybe it's time to start.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She snorts.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She snorts mentally all the way back home. Don’t you need at least the appearance of being a nice person for someone to date you without the promise of </span>
  <span>promiscuous </span>
  <span>sex at the end of the night? She contemplates herself in the mirror and tries to smile coyly. She looks like a serial killer about to dismember a thousand children.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Well, </span>
  <em>
    <span>fuck</span>
  </em>
  <span>. She is not going to see her therapist for another month at least, she can postpone this trying to date normally for at least three more weeks. Instead, she watches a lot of Hallmark movies full of meet-cutes and festive tropes, until she realizes that they all are a little racist, a little sexist and a lot homophobic.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She re-orientates her TV consumption to cooking channels.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That is utterly disgusting. I think I might throw up.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Are you talking to me or are you talking to Klare?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Both. Neither. Ugh.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Claire has now provisionally moved to Sweden where they have better healthcare and working conditions for expecting mothers and mothers with babies. She is big as a truck now and she is going to have to book a plane ticket anytime now to go to Sweden to meet the newborn.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Until the moment arrives they have taken to watching Brad Leone’s videos together as they comment on them on the phone. Somehow they have managed to get closer by being thousands of miles apart.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Garlic and honey is an unnatural mix.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sure you have put worse things in your mouth. Your ex-husband being one of them.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ugh. No! </span>
  <em>
    <span>You </span>
  </em>
  <span>are disgusting?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Again, Are you talking to me or Klare? Because I really get lost in all this sweet talking.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fuck you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So much sweet talking.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She starts to try some exotic recipes with only a few disastrous outcomes. She gets better. At cooking. Life is still a mess that sucks the energy out of her most of the time, but she has stopped crying in the tub altogether. Doesn’t she deserve a bloody commemorative chip or something?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You are absolutely right,” says Belinda the next time that they see each other for drinks. So she invites her to an expensive, unpronounceable cocktail and pats her affectionately on the cheek after giving her a peck.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How is work?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good enough, I suppose. I have quite the bunch of regular weirdos.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She downs her drink slowly, trying to memorize its taste in case this is what a victory tastes like. She is not that confident in having many of those in the future.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Weirdos are good for business. They get passionately loyal about what they like.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And what do you feel passionately loyal about?” She smiles sideways flirting shamelessly and Belinda smiles back with some amused resignation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Belinda’s rejections to her advances don’t feel like rejections really. They make her feel connected to someone somehow, oddly loved. Someone who cares enough for her so as to not shag her and dump her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“A moderated daily dose of alcohol.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ll drink to that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wakes up one day full of shallow optimism fuelled by a good night of a  martusbation-sleep combo and feels emboldened enough to demand her pound of flesh from the world. It has been taken out of her, time after, time after time, until she is barely more than metaphorical skin and bones and she wants a minimum amount of herself back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She puts on a nice summer dress that makes her look casual and not crazy and goes to the parish without a clear goal in mind. Maybe she just wants him to see that she is not as crazy as she seemed the last times they saw each other, or maybe demand a list of reasons why she is not better than God.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Probably she just wants to see him suffer a little so that all her suffering doesn’t seem so out of place in this world.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pam looks at her with utter contempt when she opens the door and tells him that there is a new priest because </span>
  <em>
    <span>her priest</span>
  </em>
  <span> left for the missions two weeks ago, that he is now in Africa. There is glee in Pam’s voice and her own smile falters as she turns around without saying another word and goes away.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Fuck Pam, fuck God and fuck the bloody universe for not letting her have even the smallest retribution.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maybe she should take it as a compliment. She has driven the guy crazy enough that he has chosen to go live in a place without running water rather than staying at a zipcode near hers.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ha. Ha.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Sure this is going to be such a funny anecdote to tell someone someday.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At least this will surely improve her karma, right? A random community in Africa is probably going to benefit from some humanitarian work thanks to her battered heart. She wishes she was the kind of person that could take comfort in that.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s getting dark when she finally sits on a bench in a park near her house. The air is starting to cool but she welcomes it. She contemplates the bizarre fantasy of finding where his mission is, buying a plane ticket with the money she is saving for Sweden and her future niece, and telling him to his face what a jerk move going to do humanitarian work has been.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A fox comes quietly and sits near the opposite end of the bench, it bends its front legs under its body and lands the underside of its snout on the grass.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It looks bored. Without a purpose.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, I know,” she says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They both stay there for a while.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>As summer comes to an end, she decides that if she is spending money on a therapist, she might as well take into account what she recommends to her, so she tries to date.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Try</span>
  </em>
  <span>, being the operative word.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There’s this guy, who is cutely weird and weirdly cute that owns one of the little shops where she buys gourmet ingredients whenever she is in the mood for feeling classy. He asks her out and she hesitates only for a second before saying yes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They go out to dinner once, twice. By the third time, it is very clear to both of them that nothing romantic is going to come out of it. They have similar tastes, compatible humour senses and completely different expectations about relationships, love and life in general. Overall the dinners don’t feel like a total waste of time and makeup, and her therapist tells her that that is how friendships that are not based on lust or common history begin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Go figure.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then Claire goes into labor so she jumps into a plane to Sweden and her metaphorical balls freeze upon arrival. She is overwhelmingly underdressed for the new country and not even in a slightly naughty way.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The fuck.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her newly born niece looks rossy and unnaturally blonde.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Have you watched </span>
  <em>
    <span>Village of the Damned</span>
  </em>
  <span>?” Claire hits her with the back of her hand from her very Swedish hospital bed. “I’m just saying that if her eyes start to shine, I’m out of here.” But she smiles as she holds the baby, so very small and real in her arms. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Claire looks tired but exultant, in a Claire kind of way that resembles dignified contempt to the unexperienced eye.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How could someone so blonde have come out of you?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Rather painfully, to tell the truth.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Klare is somewhere running an errand which is code for “containing his over-excited family for the time being and she feels a little self-conscious for their own small, dysfunctional family.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is dad going to come?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No. He is too busy with his wife’s latest project.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“At least you should be glad that our stepmother’s latest art piece doesn’t involve your vagina. I wouldn’t put it above her.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Claire grimaces and rearranges herself on the bed. “Don’t mention my vagina. It suffers from PTSD. I suffer from PTSD. I don’t think it will be able to work properly ever again and I will have to walk around with a massive plug in it so that my uterus doesn’t fall to the ground in the middle of the supermarket.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She laughs and the baby stirs in her arms.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve read it comes back to normal rather fast.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>F</span>
  </em>
  <span> you and your perfectly functional vagina.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did you just say </span>
  <em>
    <span>F</span>
  </em>
  <span>?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Claire looks pointedly at the baby and she has to roll her eyes. “</span>
  <em>
    <span>She</span>
  </em>
  <span> called me, you know?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She. Their stepmother now. Her Godmother. What a nightmare.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What did she want?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“To offer her congratulations,” says Claire, but she arches her eyebrows incredulously.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And to try to convince you to make an art project out of your stretched vagina?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No! God you are disgusting. But she did chastise me for not having a completely natural labor.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What does that mean?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No epidural, apparently. It dims the glory of the miracle of childbirth,” Claire says almost without flinching.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What? That is ridiculous!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She looks out to the empty corner of the room and imagines talking out loud.  “Drugs are cool. Drugs are great! And if they are provided by a trusted professional, kids, say absolutely yes to drugs.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What she actually says out loud it’s a little less controversial.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If I ever, ever, ever, ever have to expel something out of my body, like a child or a kidney stone I want all the drugs. All of them. I really want them to dim the experience.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The baby is asleep in her arms and she doesn’t know if she should put it back in the hospital crib or just keep it there until she wakes up again or her arms fall out. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We are bad women.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Bad feminists and bad women.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>All these expectations are suddenly exhausting and she would like to throw them all out of the window or kill them with fire, but they are like radioactive cockroaches: the only thing alive that remains after the Apocalypse. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She takes a seat and the baby doesn’t wake up. “And you are going to be the baddest and fiercest of us all,” she whispers to her niece. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Out of the corner of her eye she can see Claire’s smile.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It almost feels like a cosmical win.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She stays in Sweden for a week and then comes back to the warmth of London, which seems like an oxymoron, but it’s really not.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Life doesn’t become easier but the pain she felt every time she caught her breath is less acute these days. It doesn’t make her normal. The world is still a metaphorical dress two sizes too small and too long for her to wear; she trips and it is uncomfortable and constraining. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She learns to let go of it sometimes. To bare herself and watch the scars for what they are: proof that she is resilient enough, that maybe there are good times to come. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She tries to check if some of the dead weight off her shoulders has already taken residence in the thighs as Belinda warned.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Everything starts to slowly move forward and then it all halts on a Chatty Wednesday.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She goes out to the tables on the street to take orders and when she comes back with coffees and the sandwiches in a tray there he is, sitting in one of her chairs. Relaxed. Wearing jeans and a shirt like coming to her business is a perfectly acceptable behaviour and not the jerk move to end all jerk moves.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wishes she had a fox themed café instead of a guinea pig themed one.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She stares at him for at least a good ten seconds and he stares back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hi,” he says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The nerve.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m working.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know. I’ll have a coffee.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She snorts. She snorts so loud that half the clientele turn to look at her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t bring him a coffee, or anything for that matter, but every time she goes out for an order, he is still there, chatting with other clients or looking pensive down the street. The sun starts to fall and he is still sitting there. The clients slowly desert the place and he is still sitting there. It’s time to close the café and he is still sitting there.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I have to get the chair inside.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That is the only thing she has said to him for three and a half hours.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She is starting to wonder if he plans to follow her back home when he follows her inside the café as she is about to lock the door.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’d like to talk to you,” he says, as if they had just seen each other the day before.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She looks to the right, to the wall covered in pictures and her imaginary listener. “I’d like to punch him in the face and shag him against the counter.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He groans loudly looking at the same wall as her. “Why do you do that?! I’m right here.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, funny. I thought you were in Africa.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s already dark outside and the only light on is the one above the counter. He looks like something outworldly in the shadows.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I wasn’t sure I wasn’t going to keep running into you if I didn’t go away.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“To Africa,” she deadpans. “ Well, first trick for not running into me. Don’t come to my workplace.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You are angry.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You went to fucking Africa! You moved to another continent just to avoid the possibility of ever seeing me again. I tend to take these things personally.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He takes a step towards her, two. He looks angry now too, all pent up tension along the line of his shoulders.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I had to learn to live without you, you know? Not just survive. Live. Enjoy things and people, and places that have nothing to do with you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You really know how to boost the ego, father.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He takes another step. She refuses to step back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I got over my lust for you. I heard the voice of God again while I worked my ass off in the fucking desert.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He is very close to her now, she can’t see both his eyes at once, she feels his breath on her as he talks and her hands itch to touch him. To touch the soft, soft skin of his nape and the reassuring solidness of his chest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She wants to cry. It is hard enough to compare herself to the people on the cover of magazines, it seems rather unnecessary to keep making her compete with bloody God as well.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good for you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But it didn’t overlap you.” He leans a little sideways so that his cheek is against hers and inhales. I could still smell you in the air of the desert while I heard God.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There have been a couple of weeks with low hygiene but for my smell to get all the way to Africa... it seems a little over the top.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He leans back, takes a step back and smiles broadly, as if he just won… whatever. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The fucker.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You are nervous.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t say anything because his hands find her hips and his fingers spread and move a little towards the curve of her ass. He is about to break her. Again. Into a thousand million pieces, and she is going to let him. By God (pun intended), she is going to let him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I love you,” he says. He pushes her back against the counter, one step at a time until she feels the hard semiwall of the counter behind her and her front is pressed against him. “It didn’t fade. It didn’t pass. I don’t think it will.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He kisses her. Sweetly, for half a second, before they remember neither of them are sweet. Her right hand goes to his nape, her left one to his ass and she presses him against her more fully and he roams his own hands under her shirt. There is tongue and teeth and she wants to cry. She feels too much all at once, as if she is about to implode, or explode, or maybe just pass out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What about God?” she asks against her better judgement. Her voice raggedy, his mouth getting busy on her cleavage.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He is going to have to learn to share.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His leg makes room between hers and she gives way. “This time, I kneel,” he says with a voice that reminds her of past sins in a church.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And so he does.</span>
</p>
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